


moonlit talks

by NiamhM101



Category: Tom and Jerry (MGM/Hanna-Barbera)
Genre: Other characters mentioned - Freeform, hurt and comfort fic, mentions of heavy drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-16 17:29:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18696046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NiamhM101/pseuds/NiamhM101
Summary: Tom finds Jerry on the roof, in the middle of the night, in tears





	1. Chapter 1

Tom woke up in the middle of the night when he heard someone open and shut the living room window.

And he wasn’t stupid (not completely), he knew no one would be dumb enough to break in while pets were sleeping in that very room.

The pets included Jerry’s vicious little pooch Shredder, and the bigger pup Calvin. Both of which cared about their owner a lot and would do anything to protect the little brown mouse.

Also there was Butch on the sofa, Spike and Tyke right underneath the window, and even if Jerry’s cousin Muscles looked sound asleep from his spot on a cushion he could be wide awake and ready to fight in seconds.

Little Tweety the canary was of course sleeping in his cage, and Quacker the sleepwalking duckling was swimming laps in a bowl, with the water level low.

So only one was unaccounted for; Tom’s lifelong friend and former frenemy, Jerry.

Only that mouse would open a window so quietly, and Tom had a feeling he knew where he went; up to the roof.

Jerry went up to the roof every single night, but the cat would only wake up when the mouse comes back inside, carefully opening and shutting the window before disappearing into his mouse hole.

Tom’s curiosity got the better of him and he decided to go see exactly what Jerry did every night on that roof.

When they used to chase each other, the cat found it much easier to climb up the house than the mouse did.

So Tom reached the roof pretty quick, and saw Jerry sitting at one end of it looking up at the stars in the night sky.

And he was about to say something until he got closer.

Because he saw that Jerry was crying.


	2. Chapter 2

“Jerry?” Tom dared to whisper at last. He wasn’t at all sure how to handle this, the mouse rarely cried in front of anyone.

As the cat carefully sat down to avoid any sudden falling, Jerry quickly wiped at his eyes to try and hide the fact he had been crying.

“Tom.....hi. Sorry if I woke you.”

The cat waved a paw. “What are you doing out here so late?”

If he flat out just asked why he was crying Jerry would just deny everything.

“I just come out here to think, about a lot of things,” the mouse replied.

The cat made sure to word his next question very carefully.

“What...do you think about, exactly?”

When Jerry didn’t answer right away Tom was worried he had messed up and now he would never get an answer, but after a few seconds the little mouse let out a sigh.

“I’ve been trying to figure out....how to apologise to you.”

That was definitely not the kind of answer Tom had expected to hear. Well, he didn’t even know what he had actually been expecting in the first place but it definitely wasn’t this.

“Why would you need to apologise to me? I mean I chased after you for years over the stupidest of things! If anyone should be apologising it’s me.”

Jerry was silent for another second. “Tom, do you ever miss your owner?”

The cat didn’t hesitate to reply. “Not at all, we’re better off without her. Why?”

“I’ve just...I’ve been thinking about how it’s my fault she left in the first place.”

Tom struggled with a response because how on Earth can you respond to something like that? He didn’t blame Jerry in the slightest for his owner leaving, mostly because he couldn’t remember much about the day she stormed out and never returned.

“Why....why do you think it’s your fault?” the cat asked at last.

Jerry hesitated for a moment. “After she left you would yell at me a lot. Say it’s my fault and how I shouldn’t stay for what I did, driving her out the house.”

And the cat struggled for words once more, because in all honesty he could not remember saying anything like that. 

The mouse seemed to take the lack of response as the confusion it was. “Tom, you might not believe or want to hear this, but....you started drinking. Like, a lot, and it made you turn frightening and violent. I was scared for my life so I had to leave for a few days, and when I came back-“

Jerry cut himself off with a choked sob, and Tom started to feel incredibly guilty even though he couldn’t remember a thing. The only thing he could remember after his owner walked out the door was waking up on the kitchen floor.

“Did you find me on the kitchen floor?” the cat asked, not without some hesitation.

The mouse nodded once, and burst into tears.


	3. Chapter 3

“I-I thought you were dead. And it was my fault, and I know things are better now but I haven’t- I never told you how sorry I am.”

Tom couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and he didn’t even doubt that he did any of these things, because there was no way Jerry was cruel enough to make something serious like this up.

He sneaks out to the roof in the middle of the night to cry, for goodness sake.

And it would explain how after that morning of waking on the kitchen floor the mouse was so terrified of him.

“Jerry.....” Tom carefully lifted his tearful best friend up and held him close while he continued to cry. “It wasn’t your fault, and I’m so sorry for scaring you. I wasn’t myself and I don’t even remember doing anything like that.”

He hated himself for not knowing his best friend was suffering in silence for who knows how long, and the poor mouse was actually shaking as he wept into the cat’s fur, it was absolutely soul destroying.

So Tom let Jerry cry as much as he needed to, and the mouse definitely had a muffled whispered ‘I’m sorry’ at some point.

And eventually the poor thing fell asleep on the cat’s shoulder, and so Tom carried his best friend back inside before placing him gently on a spare cushion and curling up to sleep right beside it.

There were many nights afterwards where Jerry would go outside late at night to the roof, but Tom would go up as well. To be there for his best friend.

And even though it took a long, long time.....Jerry finally managed to be strong and move on.


End file.
